


Bruised But Not Broken, Lost But Not Forgotten

by oenimo



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: 23 years of captivity isn't too long when you're in bacta, Aayla Secura Lives, Adult Ahsoka Tano, Adult Ezra Bridger, Adult Sabine Wren, Alexsandr Kallus Needs A Hug, Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano Friendship, Anakin healing while also trying to be a dad, Artistic Liberties, Asexual Character, Asexual Luke Skywalker, Asexual Relationship, Background Relationships, Barriss Offee Redemption, Bisexual Ezra Bridger, Blind Kanan Jarrus, CT-27-5555 | ARC-5555 | Fives Lives, Captivity, Clones, Crew as Family, Darth Vader Lives, Darth Vader Redemption, Disaster Bisexual Ezra Bridger, Distrust of Barriss Offee, Distrust of clones, Dubious Science, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Eventual Relationships, F/F, F/M, Family Dynamics, Fix-It, Fix-It of Sorts, Force Ghost Obi-Wan Kenobi, Force Ghost Yoda (Star Wars), Force Ghost(s), Gen, Ghost Crew Are Family (Star Wars), Healing, Hera Syndulla Needs A Hug, Hinted Thranto, Hurt Alexsandr Kallus, Hurt/Comfort, I am the person who tags everything, Jedi Ahsoka Tano, Kanan Jarrus & Hera Syndulla as Space Parents, Kanan Jarrus Lives, Kanan getting to know Jacen, Lesbian Sabine Wren, Lightsaber Battles (Star Wars), Lightsabers (Star Wars), Luke trying to fix everything, M/M, Medical Experimentation, Medical Torture, Medical Trauma, Mentioned 212th Attack Battalion (Star Wars), Mentioned 501st Legion (Star Wars), Might go back to thrawn at some point, Minor Boil/Waxer (Star Wars), Minor CC-5052 | Bly/Aayla Secura, Most of the relationships are cute throwins more than actually focused on, Multi, Non-Explicit, Order 66 Aftermath (Star Wars), Order 66 Happened Differently (Star Wars), Other, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, POV switching up the wazoo, Parent Anakin Skywalker, Parental Hera Syndulla, Parental Kanan Jarrus, Parental Plo Koon, Parenthood, Platonic Relationships, Plo Koon is dad, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Post-Battle of Endor (Star Wars), Post-Order 66 (Star Wars), Psychological Trauma, Rebel Alexsandr Kallus, Reintegration of clones into Post-Endor society, Relationship Negotiation, Sci-Fi Science, Science Experiments, Siblings Ezra Bridger & Sabine Wren, Single Parent Anakin Skywalker, Space Siblings Ezra Bridger & Garazeb Orrelios, Tags Contain Spoilers, Team as Family, Trauma, Using Star Wars medicine to excuse physical and psychological inconsistancies, Various background Jedi, Various background clones - Freeform, Waxer Lives (Star Wars), Wedge is slightly less of a disaster, Wedge/Luke/Ezra disaster boys who don't understand their feelings, Will Ahsoka ever forgive her?, Young Jacen Syndulla, Younger Alexsandr Kallus, Younger Garazeb Orrelios, everyone babysits Jacen, focus on kalluzeb kanera and wedge/luke/ezra, long-term captivity, their ages always seemed weird to me, they're early forties post endor instead of late forties, who cares let them heal
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-23 14:00:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,059
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30056538
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oenimo/pseuds/oenimo
Summary: “No..” Kal whispered to himself. “I... This can’t be a coincidence.”The Jedi hadn't been killed, they'd been captured.23 years ago.--------Let's fix Star Wars deaths by not killing them, but instead giving them a bunch of trauma!
Relationships: Alexsandr Kallus/Garazeb "Zeb" Orrelios, Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Boil/Waxer (Star Wars), CT-7567 | Rex & Ahsoka Tano, CT-7567 | Rex & Anakin Skywalker, Ezra Bridger/Luke Skywalker, Hera Syndulla & Jacen Syndulla, Kanan Jarrus & Jacen Syndulla, Kanan Jarrus/Hera Syndulla, Leia Organa/Han Solo, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Padmé Amidala/Anakin Skywalker, Thrawn | Mitth'raw'nuruodo/Eli Vanto, Wedge Antilles/Ezra Bridger, Wedge Antilles/Ezra Bridger/Luke Skywalker, Wedge Antilles/Luke Skywalker
Comments: 22
Kudos: 60





	1. Discovery

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! First fic in a long time, and the longest thing I have literally even written.  
> There's a lot of this prewritten, so I'll probably post it semi regularly if people get interested.
> 
> Important changes to canon to note ahead of time, most of which would you could probably figure out throughout but it's better to know ahead of time.
> 
> Removing the chips also removes the double aging, meaning Rex and Wolffe aged normally after about age 13/26 ish, putting them at about 49-52 years old.  
> Luke took Vader back to base, and he's half dead in a bacta tank.  
> Fives didn't die, and is off with the Bad Batch  
> Sabine and Ahsoka are off looking for Ezra
> 
> Also I have no idea how long chapters should be, and I know my grammar is sloppy, forgive me.
> 
> Anyway, I think that's it! Enjoy what's been occupying my brain for months.
> 
> (Oh right. I thrive in positive reinforcement, so if you liked it I’d love to hear what you liked. Okay bye)

Kallus looked at his datapad in shock.

There was no way.

Since the defeat of Emperor Palpatine, the Rebellion had begun the transition from rebel group to actual government, but that’s not to say the remaining imperials had simply given up.

No, they had just gotten sloppy.

With every leftover imperial base or ship they beat, the rebellion got more and more intelligence.

And former ISB Agent, Alexsandr Kallus, had taken it upon himself to look at _all_ of it.

Much to the chagrin of Zeb, who found himself more often than not on the much too small couch in the much too small office, waiting for his partner to _finish working already._

But, as Kallus would say, sometimes data that seemed innocuous simply needed other data to make sense, and no one was more equipped to make sense of it than the former ISB Agent.

But this…

“No..” Kal whispered to himself. “I... This can’t be a coincidence.”

The Jedi hadn't been killed, they'd been captured.

23 years ago.

He looked at it again. He checked it and triple checked it but…

It made _sense,_ it was the only explanation he could think of for this data… he-

“Zeb!”

Across the room, the lasat jumped to awake- grabbing at his bo-rifle that was sitting on the ground before coming to his senses.

“ _Karabast Kal._ Don’t be so abrupt, I might’a shot you.”

Relaxing back into sitting on the couch, he peered at his partner across the room.

“What is it?”

Kal looked between him and his datapads anxiously, and Zeb quickly went from neutral to worried.

“I… I found something. I need to talk to the generals- General Syndulla especially… I-“

“Hera? Why’s it gotta be her?”

He could tell Kal was getting fidgety, wanted to do something instead of keep talking, but he took a breath, letting it out shakily before answering.

“Just… Here, come look at this, maybe you’ll see what I do.”

Zeb eyed the datapads apprehensively, but lumbered over.

“Aight, what?”

“Look at these ship logs. This one base- It never shows up twice in a log. No ship goes there twice, _except the Emperor’s personal shuttle, and Vader’s ship.”_

Zeb looked down at him, blinking sleep out of his eyes.

“They don’t go there often, and recently it’s gotten less and less traffic. So I decided to check the visit dates against events- battles, wins, losses, internal imperial affairs I remember, and while the first while was harder to determine because of the sheer volume of visits, the later ones told a story, and when I went back with that in mind, it fit with all the old entries as well.”

He pulled up a list on one of his datapads, a couple columns next to each other.

“Every time a ship other than Vader’s or the Emperor’s visited, it was within a day of a Jedi being presumed dead.” Zeb’s fur bristled in shock, but Kal just kept going. “Whenever Vader or the Emperor visited, it was within days of a hard Rebellion victory. Battles where they were personally involved, personally injured, like the first Death Star, and…” He winced, but continued. “Malachor.”

Now fully awake, Zeb picked the datapad out of Alex’s hands, and started to scroll.

“Republic” victory over the Separatists, Order 66, thousands of Jedi presumed dead.

Multitudes of ship logs.

He scrolled further.

A few weeks after the Empire’s foundation, other important battles against the remains of the Republic. Jedi who had escaped the initial order never made it out of the fights.

Ship logs.

Malachor. Temple collapses on top of Vader, week later he’s seen by rebel fighters in battle, seemingly unharmed.

Between that, a log from his personal ship.

One of the last entries catches his eye.

It’s one of the few late entries by a unique ship, instead of Vader and Palpatine.

And then his heart stops.

Days before the Liberation of Lothal- Kanan Jarrus presumed dead in fuel depot explosion.

A ship log.

He let out a wounded sound, and dropped the datapad back onto the desk.

He felt Kallus rubbing his back, Ashla bless him, grounding him to the moment.

“Wh-what does this _mean?_ ”

Kallus grimaced, before ducking his head.

“I… I have a theory, but it’s not pleasant…”

“Tell me.”

He looked up at him. Zeb’s face was grim, pained, but set firm.

“I… Every imperial hears the rumours of… experiments, by the Emperor. It was an open secret that while the Imperial High Command was bad, the Sith were worse. Seeing the evidence we have… I think that they weren’t killing the Jedi as we thought, but taking them to this base. And somehow- I don’t understand the force, it’s not my area of expertise, but it seems as if they were using the Jedi to heal themselves. That would explain the miraculous recovery times Vader always seems to have, as well as Palpatine’s long life. I mean, wasn’t he already 60 something when the Empire was founded? It’s been almost 25 years, but he fought Skywalker, a 20 something, and almost won?” He shook his head. “It’s what makes the most sense to me.”

“So Hera…”

He closed his eyes, and took a centering breath.

“When I saw the trip after Kanan... She has to know regardless, regardless of if my theory is right, regardless of what all of command decides about this. I thought it would be best to… give it to her first.”

Zeb nodded stiffly, and Kal wrapped an arm around his back, which he gratefully accepted.

“We’ve gotta go tell’r…”

“Zeb, I can do this-“

“No, I gotta be there for ‘er. Come on, sooner the better right?”

* * *

“General Syndulla!”

Hera turned from the command centre at her name, with a slightly annoyed look.

“Kallus, how many times do I have to tell you that you can call me Hera. It’s been 5 years; I think we’re there.” As she spoke, she watched the hasty approach of both Kallus and Zeb, running through the command centre staff until they were both standing in front of her, just slightly puffing for breath, stacks of datapads in Zeb’s arms, and a couple in Kallus’.

“Right. Hera. I’ve found some… Important intel in the databanks we got from the Bothawui Base.” He paused and looked around. “This might be something better discussed in relative private.”

Hera arched an eyebrow at him, but then sighed and motioned at General Dodonna. “Anyone else you need in the room? And this better not take long, I really wanted to spend this evening with Jacen.” She said with a pointed look.

Kallus cringed, knowing she would probably jump ship immediately at his news, no matter how much she had wanted to see her kid. “Uh, Skywalker is probably a good idea, and maybe the clones if they’re on base right now.”

Hera sighed again, and quickly barked some orders at a command centre assistant who paged the three Kallus had requested.

“Alright well, do you want to get started or wait?”

“Let’s go in and wait?” He looked at Zeb, hoping to see backup, and relaxed a bit when he saw that he wasn’t going to be left in the room with all the generals (and the high emotions the news would cause) by himself. Zeb looked back down at him, shoulders and jaw set with determination. If there was even a chance that Kanan was at that compound, he had to try to go get him.

* * *

“Okay.” Kallus looked around the smaller, personal command office of the generals. Standing around the table with him were Zeb, both Luke _and_ Leia (he wasn’t sure why she was there, but even half his age or less she was an imposing woman, and he wasn’t going to question her), Skywalker’s droid, Hera (gulp), Dodonna, Rex, and Wolffe. He found himself wishing again that Sabine and Ahsoka hadn’t just left on their quest to find Ezra, because he knew how much they would need to know about this turn of events.

“I asked you all here because of some intel I found while combing through the databanks from the Bothawui Base. A recurring pattern appeared in the travel logs. There seems to be a secret base, known to very few in the Empire, on Pion, out in Wild Space. I didn’t even know of it myself when I was ISB, and ISB operated outside of the military chain of command.” He glanced around the circle before continuing. “At first distinguishing a pattern from the visits seemed impossible, right after the end of the Clone Wars, there was travel there very often, but as the years went the journeys dwindled enough to recognize a possible reason.” He fiddled with the datapad in front of him that bore his spreadsheet of information until it holoprojected from the table. “Almost every time someone came to the base, it was within a few days of the death or disappearance of a Jedi.” Out of the corner of his eye he saw Hera and Luke’s eyes widen, but he powered through. “If it wasn’t after a death, it was after a big, casualty-inflicting fight for Vader or Palpatine, for example, the battle and explosion on Malachor.” He pulled up the two different data points, Ezra, Kanan, and Ahsoka’s travel log, and Vader’s travel log he had found in the archives, dated within days of each other.

“Truthfully, I don’t have a great understanding of the Force, which is why I asked for Commander Skywalker. It seems to me, with some assumptions about how the Force works, that the Emperor was... somehow healing himself and Vader, using captured Jedi. But that’s just my theory. Regardless, the fact that trips were made after every ‘death’ seems worth an investigation.” Kal leaned back, and felt a pat on his lower back from Zeb, but as he looked up he saw he was looking intently, and worriedly, at Hera.

Hera, on her part, seemed to be holding up stronger than he had maybe given her credit for. She almost looked in shock, but holding it together behind a veneer of General attitude. Meanwhile, across the table, Luke, Leia, and the clones looked flabbergasted.

“You’re telling me there might be Jedi I can learn from there?! That there’s force healing that could heal my father?! We have to go check!”

“Kid, I don’t know about all of them, but if they’ve been there since the Clone Wars...” Rex let out a heavy sigh. “There might not be much of them left in their own heads. Captivity for that long could drive anyone to madness, even if they were a Jedi.” He turned to face Kallus again, and gave him a strong stare. “I saw the Generals in the Clone Wars do a lot of crazy stuff, but I never saw them heal anyone. But I knew Palpatine as the Chancellor, and he was an old and frail politician at the time. If he had access to some strange Sith healing powers, it would explain how he looks the way he does but still managed to give Luke here _and_ Vader a run for their money. Can’t win a two on one fight with a kid when you’re eighty unless something is going on.”

Kallus gave him an eager, but serious look. “Exactly! If we can-”

“Kallus.”

He stopped talking immediately as Hera cut him off. He had been waiting, unsure of how she’d react, but as he looked at her, he saw that her eyes were rimmed with red, but still as she spoke it had no waver, no sign of weakness.

She looked him dead in the eye. “Was there a trip after... after Kanan.” 

“Yes.”


	2. Heading Out

It took them a day to sort out the logistics of the trip. Wild Space was no joke, they’d need to take Luke with them even if there weren’t Jedi involved, just to find a path through the gravity wells, black holes, and other uncharted space terrors.

Hera was coming. She had begun prepping the ship the second she got back to it, warming up old systems that hadn’t gotten as much exercise after the main war had ended, and then finding something to do with Jacen. No matter how much she wanted to hope she could find Kanan there, she knew that the chances were low, the danger was high, and the chances of unspeakable horrors in the facility were even higher. So, instead of doing the most planning she could for the trip, she had to find childcare in a burgeoning government system. Eventually she decided that Wedge was the most responsible of the people left on base, and he was more than happy to take in Jacen for a few days. Hera couldn’t bring herself to tell him that they were going into Wild Space. She couldn’t even bring herself to think about it. She was _not_ going to leave Jacen with no parents. She was _going_ to come back, and _dammit,_ it would be with Kanan if she could do anything about it.

Luke had already begun to worry about the trip by the end of Rex’s speech. He had been a Jedi for what, 4 years? And almost all of that was without anyone to train him, just a couple of old books he had taken from Yoda’s hut after he… died? Unclear, he just kinda… faded. From reading the texts he gathered that sometimes Jedi and other force sensitives could do that instead of dying any traditional way, just sort of decide they were done. But he had very little idea about strange ancient Sith powers? How was he supposed to help or fix Jedi if they found some, he barely knew how to use his current powers! But, he was the only one left. He had heard some of the others, mainly Phoenix Squadron, talking about Ahsoka. He wasn’t entirely sure, but it seemed like she had survived the Clone Wars, and then the Empire, but had just... left. He wasn’t close with General Syndulla, and the remaining Phoenix Squadron mostly stuck to themselves, so he’d never really learned more about the two missing Jedi from Phoenix Squadron. All he had heard was that one of them had disappeared, and the other had died, very soon before the Battle of Yavin.

Luke heaved a sigh and started packing the last of the things he was bringing with them on the trip to Pion. He glanced once more over and his shelf of ancient Jedi texts, before shaking his head. He couldn’t bring those to Wild Space. What if they didn’t come back? Someone else would come along to rebuild the Jedi, he had to leave the books in case.

R2 whirred as he rolled into the room, and butted against Luke’s legs.

“No bud, you’ll be more useful here. We don't know what’s going to happen out in Wild Space, and besides, the General and her astromech basically come as a package deal.”

R2 whirred and beeped a bit more, clearly annoyed at being left behind in favour of Chopper, but Luke just shook his head fondly and stood up.

As he turned around to head out, he was startled by the figure of Wedge in his doorway, and even more surprised by the small kid Wedge had balanced on his hip.

“Oh! Uh, hi Wedge!” Luke glanced between his face and General Syndulla’s toddler. “Whatcha got there?”

Wedge smiled and sort of bounced Jacen, lightly enough not to wake him up from the little nap he seemed to be taking.

“Heh, the General is trusting me to take of this little guy while you guys are gone on your secret mission.” He looked back up at Luke. “How big’s the mission? The General said you’d be gone for at least a couple days, if not a week!”

Luke frowned, not wanting to worry his friend with any bad news, especially since he’d be taking care of the general’s kid while they were gone… but he had to be honest.

“Heh, yeah. Kallus really hit the jackpot in the intel from Bothawui. Well, either it’s a jackpot, or it’s nothing, or it’s a trap.” He quirked an eyebrow. “But you know how much I like walking into traps.”

Wedge rolled his eyes. “Yeah, you and the Cloud City debacle, not to mention just willingly going with Vader on Endor.” He cuffed Luke gently on the shoulder. “Take better care of yourself man, we all want you to come back you hear?”

Luke let out a soft laugh, and gave a small smile. “Of course Wedge. Wouldn’t want to desert you here with a kid, barely a job, and no friends.”

R2 let out a mechanical laugh, enjoying the jabs.

“Hey! Uncalled for!” Wedge barked a laugh, and pulled Luke in for a one-armed hug, keeping Jacen from being sandwiched. After perhaps a bit longer than a usual hug, Luke slung his bag over his shoulder, and gave Wedge a mock salute on his way out of the room. As he left, R2 beeped in laughter again and rolled out in the other direction, leaving Wedge to wonder what the astromech was chuckling about. 

In various other parts of the base, the rest of the crew got ready in their own ways. Rex and Wolffe sat in a room together, taking shots of Corellian whiskey, and talking quietly about Jedi masters of the past. Kallus was furiously copying data to extra datapads, ones he could take with him to know exactly what he needed, without the possibility of the rebellion losing the information. Zeb sat in the one chair in his bunk, just staring at the room, thinking of the Jedi that they couldn’t find on Pion, and the one they could.

Finally, they all got a beep on their comms.

“It’s time. Get yourselves to the Ghost.”

Hera sat in the pilot’s seat, checking and double-checking instruments as she heard the rest of her “crew” file into the Ghost. She heard more than saw Rex settle into the co-pilot’s seat, and felt Zeb rest a large hand on her shoulder before speaking.

“We’re all ready to go.”

“Engaging hyperdrive.”

And they made their first jump.

* * *

Luke found himself on a pretty unfamiliar ship, surrounded with fellow rebels but not ones he’d worked particularly close with throughout the years. He looked around the ship, seeing multitudes of graffiti, including some of people and creatures he recognized, like loth-cats, and some of the crew he was in the room with.

“Wow… who did all this?” He said, gesturing around the common room.

The grumpy clone across from him grumbled, but his face softened a little.

“That’d be Sabine. She was one of the main crew of the Ghost here leading up to the Battle of Yavin.” He shot a glance towards the cockpit before continuing. “She stopped being as involved in the rebellion after Lothal was freed, probably why you never met her. According to Hera, her and Commander Tano went off to look for Bridger a few weeks ago.”

Luke turned to look at Wolffe more when he mentioned Tano.

“Commander Tano, that’s Ahsoka right? I’ve heard some people around the base talking about her, she’s a Jedi right?”

Wolffe chuckled. “In a way. Back when I knew her most, she was a Jedi padawan during the Clone Wars, served with Rex. Saw her occasionally when our units worked together, but she left the order before the end of the war. I never saw her again, but I heard from Rex that came back for the battle of Mandalore near the end of the war, not as a Jedi, just independent.”

Wolffe gave him a brisk nod, then started to head to the bunks.

“You should get some sleep kid, no idea what we’ll be getting into when we get there.”

Luke sat down quietly on the bench, uninterrupted except for the astromech (Chopper, he have to remember that. He’d heard the droid was a grumpier one, and heard a few stories from R2 to back it up) whizzing down the hallway to do something.

Meanwhile in the cockpit, Hera sat staring intently at her instruments, while Rex and Zeb kept glancing at each other, around the room, back at Hera, and then back at anything else so that it didn’t _look_ like they were checking on Hera. Meanwhile, Kallus had sat down in one of the back seats, and had begun to grow bored of the checking-but-not-checking, and had begun scrolling through his datapads, trying to find as much info about what they could be getting into as he could.

Finally, Hera had had enough.

“Zeb, I swear to Force if you don’t stop _watching me pilot,_ I will kick you off my bridge.”

She turned to look at him with a glare, then quickly faced Rex sitting next to her.

“You’re also on thin ice Captain, but if you just co-pilot like you’re supposed to you can stay.”

Rex looked up at her guiltily from where he had been pretending to look at the dash, and gave a small salute. From behind them all, Kallus snickered.

“Alrigh’ alrigh’, I’ll go sleep. It’s getting to the time we’d usually sleep back at base anyway. Just, wake me up if something happens.” He glanced at Kal for a second, before starting to walk out to the bunks.

“I’m sure if something goes wrong, you’ll notice Zeb, now get out of here and let me work.” Hera started to turn back to the viewport but then added. “Oh, and send the kid if he’s awake, we’re going to run out of the planned jumps soon enough, and then I’ll need him.”

Zeb grumbled an affirmative and continued down the hall.

Soon, the three in the command centre were joined by the only slightly nervous looking blond man, who sat down in the chair across the aisle from Kal, quickly folding his legs up crossed and closing his eyes.

A few jumps later, Kal stood up and stretched, a few pops echoing in the almost silent cabin.

“I’ll be joining Garazeb then, make sure you all get some sleep.”

Two noncommittal hand waves, and a quiet snore from Rex were all he got in response before going back to the bunks.

Passing the couple other bunks, he wondered which ones the rest of the crew would use in the trip. He could hear snores coming from Kanan’s old bunk, which made sense since it had basically become Rex’s even before Kanan’s death, with the Jedi sleeping in Hera’s quarters more often than not. Would the kid end up in Sabine’s room? Maybe he’d just pull a Rex and fall asleep in the cockpit. Smiling lightly to himself at the idea, he reached Zeb’s room. Letting himself in quietly, he let his smile grow when he heard faint snuffling and purring coming from the bunk. He pulled off the more unruly parts of his clothes: boots, jacket, belt, (had to stay combat ready, who knows when they’d hit Wild Space), and slipped in next to Zeb in the rather small bunk. Almost immediately being glomped by the sleeping Lasat, he let himself relax into the soft warmness, and fell asleep rather quickly.

Back in the pilot’s seat, Hera’s was quickly approaching the end of the planned hyperspace jumps. The much longer part of the journey she knew was going to be having Skywalker find jumps using the Force to get through the uncharted space, to the planet they didn’t even have a solid location for.

Cracking her knuckles over the dashboard, she stood up quietly and tucked an old jacket over the sleeping Rex in the co-pilot chair, before heading over to Luke. He made her heart hurt to look at him. Even though she knew they wouldn’t look anything alike, every time she saw Luke, she couldn’t help but think that that was how old Ezra was now. Sighing, she went to tap the kid on his shoulder, but before she could make contact she was startled by the opening of his eyes.

“General. What do you need? Is it time to start finding the hyperspace routes?”

Recovering quickly, she nodded. “I’ll go get Chopper for you, you can tell him what you’re picking up on, and he can program it into the computer.” She shot a glance at Rex, and continued. “Just… try to be quiet. I can’t lift Rex myself, and I wouldn’t want to wake Zeb for something as small as that. I’m going to try to rest, but if you need anything you come wake me up, okay? This is my ship.”

Luke nodded solemnly before unfolding and heading towards the pilot’s seat.

“Oh, and Luke? Once you’ve found a couple longer ones -Chopper will let you know- you can get some rest too.” She hesitated for a second before continuing. “There’s an empty bunk, the one with all the drawings. You can sleep there, or just follow Wolffe’s snores to Rex’s room, I’m sure he wouldn’t mind you taking the other bed.”

Luke nodded, and gave a small smile. “When you’re forced to bunk with Chewie in the Falcon for a few years, human snoring is nothing.”

Hera smiled, and walked out of the room. Soon he was joined instead by Chopper who rolled in, beeping something rude in binary.

“Alright alright, the faster we get this started, the faster you can get back to whatever you were doing.”

With that, Luke resumed his meditation pose, and quickly began to actively search the Force for the safe routes to Pion, which he had found a hint of in his earlier Force meditation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been told my Luke feels more like ANH Luke than RotJ Luke, but... oh well.  
> Also, for the most part the droids won't be speaking, even if the people around understand. Just a personal preference. Though there is some bits later where they do. I'm inconsistant, sue me.


	3. Pion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gang gets to Pion, where surprises abound

It was a long six standard days before they got to what Luke told them was Pion.

Days of slowly less competitive dejarik, light planning because of their lack of information, a lot of reading on Kallus’ part, and a lot of mediating on Luke’s, brought them to their day of arrival.

A lazy game of dejarik between the two clones, observed by Zeb while Kallus sat nearby scribbling about possible defense mechanisms of the base was interrupted by the comms coming to life. Hera’s practiced calm came through, warning them that the jump they were about to make was to be the last one according to Luke. It would take an hour, but then they’d be there.

Quickly wrapping up their various activities, the men began to prep their supplies for arrival. Checking blasters, packing various gadgets to help them break through common imperial security systems, and in case of their best-case scenario: packing relief supplies. Soon Chopper loudly beeped his way into the common room with an arrival warning, and Rex, Wolffe, and Zeb quickly headed out to their respective guns, with Kallus and Chopper heading to the bridge.

As they entered, they saw Luke standing looking out the viewport, and Hera steel herself on the controls. Not long after, they dropped out of hyperspace and looked on Pion for the first time.

In front of them was a small, rocky planet. Barren, nothing but cliffs and rocky ground as far around the planet as they could see.

“Chopper, scan for any sign of a base.”

A quick couple of binary beeps later, and Chopper swiveled his head back to Hera and beeped a response.

“Chopper can’t pick up any life forms from this far away, but he’s detecting some sort of organic matter on the other side of the planet.” Hera said over the comms. “We’ll have to go around.”

Everyone was on high alert in the bridge, watching for any signs of the Imperial base as they slowly made their way to the other side of the planet.

“There!” Luke exclaimed, pointing through the viewport.

“Wolffe, Rex, Zeb: Be on high alert. We don’t know how protected this base is. Be ready for fighters.”

But as they approached, no TIEs came to meet them.

“Chopper, are we close enough to scan for life forms.”

Chopper whirred and beeped at Hera but was interrupted by Luke.

“I can… feel something. It’s weak, but there.”

Chopped whirred up at Hera again.

“Seems you’re right Luke. Chopper is picking up on dozens of life signs, but most of them are barely strong enough to register.” Hera frowned deeply, and Kallus wrang his hands. After a minute of thinking, Hera flipped on the comms channel again.

“Be on alert, I’m going to land.” She swiveled around to face Kallus. “You two, go down to the entrance, be ready in case of a ground assault.” Kallus gave her a nod and gestured for Luke to follow him down to the cargo bay, Luke already going to grab his lightsaber off his belt.

As the last two organic crew left the room, Hera focused back in on the viewport and the controls and sighed.

“Kanan… If you’re here… We’re getting you out.”

Hera pulled the ship into the small dock at the front of the base, landed with the grace of an experienced pilot, then grabbed her gun and headed down to the cargo bay to join the assault.

Sliding down the ladder to the rest of the crew, Hera began to speak.

“Okay. I’ve left Chopper keeping the engine warm in case this is just one big trap for us. So far we haven’t met any resistance, but there’s no idea what will be in there.” She glanced around the circle of men. “Everyone ready?”

Firm nods were her only response, and everyone leveled their weapons to the door, ready to fight, as Hera hit the controls for the bay door.

Tensed and ready, they watched the door lower… to see nothing waiting for them except an empty landing platform. But then doors to the compound slid open across the bay from them, and a handful of ...black and red troopers and one imperial guard made their way out.

“Ah Karabast. Couldn’ ah just been regular stormtroopers could it?” Zeb said with a growl, and extended his bo-rifle and ran out the door to meet the imperial guard halfway across the landing pad.

Soon the battle was on, black and red troopers and the rest of the crew fighting and shooting, at first from afar but then closer and closer until Kallus and Hera, and Wolffe and Rex were engaged in melee combat with one trooper per team. Luke took the last two troopers on, and was shocked to see them pull out weapons capable of being hit by his lightsaber.

But then Luke received a hard kick to the back, stumbling to the ground. Flipping over quickly to defend himself against the new assailant, he clashed his lightsaber against a distinctly red one.

“Wha-”

Standing above him pressing their red, double bladed lightsaber into him, was a figure covered head to toe in black, and wearing a black metal helmet that doubled as a mask.

Quickly Luke came to his senses, pushing the figure away slightly with the Force, and rolling away from the lightsaber that he knew would come down farther any second.

Hopping to his feet, he couldn’t help but question out loud the appearance of this new fighter.

“Hey guys! Who the kark is this?!”

Dodging a hit from the trooper she was fighting; Hera glanced over at Luke and swore loudly.

“Kriffing hells, I thought all the inquisitors had died! I haven’t seen one since well before Yavin!”

Before Luke had time to respond, Hera was already busy deflecting another hit from the purge trooper, and he was being approached slowly by the shadowy figure.

“Ah… a new Jedi. Time to join the rest of your order where you belong.”

And with that, they pounced.

Twirling out of the way and making his own swing, Luke yelled back at them.

“The rest of them? Are they here?!”

A cold laugh emerged from the helmet as they leaned in closer over their clashing lightsabers, dangerously close to both of their throats.

“What, like you aren’t here for them? But I will not disappoint Lord Sidious like the rest of my siblings.”

Now even more confused, Luke couldn’t think of anything else to say, and simply continued to block swings, and attack when he saw an opening.

Farther away from the chaos of the purge trooper squad, Zeb was beginning to get the upper hand over the imperial guard he was fighting.

Jumping around the guard, he jabbed the electric end of his bo-rifle in between the man’s shoulder blades, and held it there as he convulsed, and after a minute fell to the ground.

Looking up and back at the rest of the crew he growled.

Yards away from him, Hera, the clones, and _Kallus_ were taking on 4 of these strange red and black troopers, while Luke fought a few yards further away against… Karabast, was that an inquisitor? Zeb took off towards the rest of the fight, grabbing the guard’s force pike before leaving the red cloaked body behind him.

Jumping into the fray, he passed the pike to Kallus, figuring he out of anyone would be able to figure out the staff quick enough to make use of it. Sure enough, Kallus immediately jabbed it under the chest armour of the trooper he was fighting, then flicked a button on the handle, turning _something_ on and shocking the trooper hard until he went limp, seemingly passed out or dead.

Zeb let out a satisfied laugh and Kal quickly kicked the body away from the pike and spun around on the other troopers with the ignited weapon. The five fighting the troopers regrouped, ending up back-to-back before launching themselves at the troopers again, now with the numbers advantage.

Meanwhile, Luke and the new inquisitor were continuing to clash, and slowly making their way closer and closer to the edge of the landing pad. Swiping his saber at the figure’s feet, Luke succeeded in making them jump back, teetering now on the edge of the landing pad.

Slightly smug, Luke was worried to see the inquisitor look over his shoulder, then tilt their head at him and jump backwards off the landing pad. Eyes wide, Luke watched as their lightsaber blades began to spin, and make them glide away across the rocky landscape, landing miles away on the planet’s surface before breaking into a run.

Shaking himself from his shock, Luke turned around to join the fight against the troopers, only to find Hera holding a blaster to the last trooper’s head, with two more troopers groaning on the ground, and one almost completely still except for haggard breathing.

Quickly making his way over to the group, he watched as Rex Wolffe and Hera yanked the helmets off of the three awake troopers. As their faces were revealed, the group gasped together in shock at the three’s very familiar faces.

“Wha- Clones!?” Rex was the first to break the silence, staring agape at the people in front of him. Then his eyes widened even further as he took in the three of them, and Wolffe let out a choked sob, much to the surprise of the Ghost crew.

“Comet… Boost, Sinker…”

The three clones, guns to their heads, glared at them all.

Luke leant down and pulled the helmet off of the passed-out trooper, revealing yet another clone.

Rex turned to Hera and signaled her to come talk. Leaving the rest of the crew with the defeated troopers, Rex spoke to her a few feet away.

“Hera… That’s Wolffe's old unit, the Wolfpack. We… we can’t kill them.”

Hera nodded solemnly at Rex, but with pain in her eyes.

“I guess we’ll have to lock them up for now, see if we can get through to them, remove the… chips, right?”

Rex nodded slowly, looking pensive.

“Thing is, I only started aging normal once the chip was out… I don’t know why they aren’t old by now, with the chips intact they should be aging double speed. I… don’t even want to think about them doing this willingly.”

Hera rested a hand on his shoulder, then walked back to the group.

“Alright. Zeb? You got cuffs on you?”

Zeb yanked some cuffs out of a bag of supplies on his back and started to put them onto the three scowling clones, before moving onto the unconscious one.

“What’re we doin’ with em Hera? Putting them back into the ship until we’re done?”

Hera nodded, and Zeb heaved the one onto his shoulder while forcing the awake ones forward to the ship, aided by Kallus.

She glanced over at Wolffe, now being quietly talked to by Rex, before turning to Luke.

“So, the Inquisitor got away?”

Luke rubbed the back of his and responded.

“Yeah, I uh, didn’t know they’d be able to fly.”

“Figures kid. You haven’t met an inquisitor before have you?”

Luke shook his head before looking out towards the cliff they had jumped off of.

“We saw some of those in the lead up to Yavin. Kanan and Ezra fought them off multiple times, even Zeb went head-to-head with them. They were a specialized unit sent to hunt down surviving Jedi.”

“And bring them here apparently” Luke quipped.

Hera frowned sadly, before looking back at the compound.

“Having an inquisitor certainly makes Kallus’ theory seem more likely… and those troopers, they looked almost like death troopers but… not quite.”

Their quiet conversation was interrupted by Rex clearing his throat behind them, and they turned to see the other four men standing there waiting for the next step of the mission.

“Right.” Hera faced them all, features settling back into the strong General facade. “Given the amount of lifeforms we picked up, I doubt that’s all of the troopers we’ll be encountering. Stay alert, but new rules are disable, not kill. We don’t know how many of them are clones, they deserve a chance to have their chips removed and make their own decision about the Empire.”

Receiving five firm nods, she continued.

“We’ll have to enter the complex. Chances are high it’s filled with more of these troopers, and maybe more Imperial guards as well.” She was cut off by Kallus clearing his throat.

“Purge troopers. They’re like death troopers but for the inquisitors. I only saw them a few times, when the Grand Inquisitor was around. I had no idea they were clones… Clones were phased out of the regular imperial army so long ago I didn’t think any troopers were still clones.”

Hera gave him a curt nod, then continued her instructions.

“Right. We have to be ready for more purge troopers, and imperial guards. And I’m sure that inquisitor will come back, especially considering Skywalker.”

Hera turned to the complex.

“Let’s get on with it then.”

* * *

Kallus made quick work of the locked compound door, and soon they were stalking through the rather dark hallways of the base. Like every other imperial base, it was essentially a maze of square corridors, and as they entered Hera made the executive decision to split up.

“Scouring this whole place as one group will take forever. Rex, Wolffe, Luke, you go right, comm us if you find anything or you need more help. Me, Zeb, and Kal will take the left side.” Spotting a worried look on Luke’s face, she continued. “Even if the inquisitor shows up we should be fine, Zeb’s fought some before, and with the pike he stole off of the guard out there we should be able to hold our own.”

Luke nodded, and the group split off to their own corridors.

“Hey Kal” Zeb started. “You wouldn’t happen to have found _plans_ for this base in all your intel searching, didja?”

Kallus rolled his eyes. “No. If I had found plans we would’ve been using them from the start.” He then eyed a terminal ahead of them in the hallway. “However, I might be able to find some with a bit of time at that computer.”

Hera nodded, and they made their way forward to the terminal. Kal leaned his new staff against the terminal before starting to type away into it while Zeb and Hera faced the hallway with their weapons drawn.

* * *

In a different hallway, Luke walked between the two clones, eyes half closed trying to sense the life forms he had before. Rex chuckled and turned back slightly to look at Wolffe.

“Just like the old days huh? Having a Jedi work their magic while the clones take lookout.”

Wolffe let out a light chuckle, but then went back to scanning the hallways around them.

“This way… I can feel people this way.”

Listening to the new Jedi, they made their way down the corridor until they reached another intersection, and continued this cycle until they finally got to a door Luke decided was the right one.

“Here. I can sense… multiple life forces behind here but it’s impossible for me to tell if they’re hostiles or not.” Grabbing his lightsaber off his belt and igniting it, he hit the panels, and let out a gasp.

The three men made their way into the room, weapons still drawn as a precaution, but looking wildly around at the sight in front of them.

They came into a room much darker than the hallway had been. Looking around, they could see about ten cylinders running the length of the room. Luke stepped forward towards the closest one, lightsaber still ignited, and peered at the shadow inside.

Behind him, Rex and Wolffe both gasped, and Rex let out a hushed “General Secura…”

Bringing his lightsabers closer to the controls near the bottom of the cylinder, Luke peered at them and hit a button.

“Woah! Commander! We don’t know what these things do!” Rex hissed at him, but they all watched as the tube slowly drained of fluid, restraints now holding the blue twi’lek in a standing position, and a previously invisible seam split near the side as the tube’s newfound door opened itself a crack.

“They… they look like modified bacta tanks. I got put in one after the fight in Cloud City, I figured the buttons would mean the same thing.”

“That’s a big gamble to take on the life of a General sir.” Rex continued to whisper.

Luke looked over his shoulder at the older man, seemingly unperturbed by his anger.

“General? So she was one of the Jedi generals from the Clone Wars?”

Rex sighed, and nodded.

“General Aayla Secura. Bly worked under her, 327th Star Corps.”

“Right. Well, we can’t help them until we can get them out of these tanks, and we don’t know how much time we have until more troops come around.”

The two clones nodded and seemed to have their own conversation entirely in facial expressions and looks, before one of them spoke again.

“I’ll go watch in the hallway sir. You and Rex can get everyone else out. If there’s any trouble, I’ll holler.”

Just then, Aayla stirred in her restraints, and then jumped to attention, flinching away from the door of the tube.

Immediately Luke turned his attention back to the slightly emancipated figure.

“Hey… Hey it’s okay. We’re with the rebellion, we’re here to get you out.”

Seeing that that hadn’t particularly worked in calming the woman down, he backed up slightly, and tried to project reassurance through the Force, something he had only tried a handful of times before.

A few pods down, Rex remarked out loud. “Hey kid, I don’t know what you did, but all of them just relaxed, like subconsciously.”

Luke looked back up at Aayla, who was still eyeing him suspiciously.

“See? I’m a friend.”

She continued to eye him, but he saw her swallow, and try a couple times to speak, before managing to get out any words. Her voice heavy with disuse, she croaked.

“You… you aren’t a Sith… Your saber is green…”

After speaking, she quickly dissolved into a fit of coughs, but was unable to double over because of her restraints.

Luke made a movement to approach, but seeing the twi’lek tense up even amidst coughing, he paused.

“General… I would like to cut your restraints, and then I can get you a blanket out of my bag to wrap yourself in. Would that be okay?”

Controlling her breathing, Aayla looked up at him, and he felt the distinct feeling of someone trying to probe his mind, but very weakly. Knowing that it was his best chance to gain her trust, he let go and let her look. Seemingly satisfied with what she found, she nodded, and Luke quickly but carefully cut the restraints holding her arms up so she would stay standing, and soon found himself holding her up as her legs gave out and she tumbled forward into him.

Almost immediately, Rex was at his side, helping him settle Aayla into his arms, and quickly pulling one of the emergency blankets they had brought (they were flimsy cloth, but it was more than what the prisoners had now) and wrapped it around the old general’s shoulders. Soon she had pulled it tighter around herself, and settled shakily onto the floor, still looking around the room as if she was expecting a purge trooper or an inquisitor to jump out of a hiding space.

While she settled, Rex took the time to examine her from afar, checking on her condition. For being held for 23 years (presumably), she seemed like she hadn’t aged _that_ much. He guessed that was some property of the liquid and the coma she was in whenever she was inside. The biggest problems he could physically see were the gauntness of her, seemingly over having had fluids to keep her alive, and the persistent hollowness to her eyes as she shook on the ground.

But after barely a minute, Luke touched his shoulder.

“Captain, we have to get the rest of them out. The vibro-blades we brought from base should be enough to cut the restraints on them, but give them each time to understand why we’re here before you get in too close.”

Rex had to resist the urge to roll his eyes at the young man. He had probably seen more rescued prisoners than Luke would ever see, but here he was listening to him tell him what to do with these ones. Just nodding, he headed over to the next pod on the left, and hit its button, starting to drain some of the liquid from around a Tholothian he thought looked vaguely familiar.

Luke in turn, headed over to the next tube on the right, doing the same thing, but hitting his comm.

“Hera? We’ve found some. Around ten in here, I talked to one, Rex called her General Aayla Secura, she was one of the Jedi generals back in the Clone Wars.”

Through his comlink, Hera responded.

“Right. Kallus has hacked his way into the systems here, started pulling up manifests. There’re at least 50 prisoners here, maybe more. He got locked out again. Be alert. If someone blocked this terminal’s access, it’s very likely they know you opened that door.”

“Yes sir.”

* * *

Back at the terminal, Kallus gave a frustrated sigh before backing away from the computer.

“They’ve completely shut this terminal down, probably all of them now that they know we’re inside.” He looked over at Hera while picking up the pike again. “What were they saying?

“Said they found about ten prisoners, one of them was definitely a General in the Clone Wars. Other than that, not much. Did you get anything else from the system before they shut you out?”

Kallus rubbed his face. “One of the cells should be down this direction, and the headquarters is that way.” He said, pointing in different directions. “I couldn’t look at the locations for the other cells fast enough.”

Zeb patted him on the back, and started walking down the hallway Kal had indicated the cell was down.

“It’s a place to start, let’s get going, hopefully we can get to the first group before the troopers find us.”

They weren’t so lucky. A few hallways down, they ran into another squad of purge troopers, and even with the bo-rifle and the force-pike, it took them a good while to subdue, cuff, and hide away the troopers before they could continue.

Pushing the open button for a room close by, Kallus froze.

“General? I believe I’ve found another room of prisoners.”

Hera and Zeb rushed over to him, and they all walked in, greeted by much of the same sight that the other group had. At least ten tubes, lined up in semi darkness, with faint electric lights coming from panels at the bottom. Nodding to each other, they each went over to different pods, and started the draining process, then made their way to other pods, until all ten were beginning to drain.

“Well, isn’t this nice. You weren’t the one I was looking for, but I might as well get you nuisances out of the way before I deal with the _actually_ dangerous member of your team.”

In the doorway, the black wrapped figure ignited their lightsaber, and leapt towards Hera.

Before Hera could even think of dodging, she found herself looking at Kal’s back as he clashed the force pike against the inquisitor’s lightsaber.

“Get them out of here safe, and for God’s sake comm Luke before this thing can take my head off!” Kallus yelled over his shoulder at the two Spectres.

Wide eyed, Hera grabbed at her comm.

“Luke! The inquisitor is back, we need you. Track Kallus with your comm, he’s holding them back until you can get here.”

She looked over at Zeb, who had started growling and looked a second away from jumping at the inquisitor himself.

“Zeb! We can’t do anything to help him, our weapons would just be destroyed! We have to get these people out of here.”

Zeb looked at her quickly before rushing over to one of the pods near him, vibro-blade drawn.

Hera quickly turned her attention to the tube behind her, the closest on to the ongoing fight between Kallus and the mystery inquisitor. She looked at him for the first time and cursed. A kel dor. She’d have to leave him until last, she couldn’t remove him from that tube for more than a few seconds or he’d die. Looking wildly around the room and cursing, she couldn’t see anything she could use as an impromptu breathing mask or “airtight” helmet for him. Running over to the next pod, she commed Luke again.

“Luke! While you’re coming, I need you to stop at room 217. We dumped some troopers in there, I need you to grab some of their helmets. We have at least one kel dor in here that will need it to survive.”

“Yes ma’am!” She heard a panting Luke on the other side of the comm, accompanied by heavy footfalls, before she clicked it off quickly and continued opening the tubes.

Meanwhile, Kallus had begun to force the inquisitor ever so slightly towards the hallway, and away from the rescue operation.

They seemed to almost hiss at him as they realized this. “You think you’re so clever, don’t you? No matter what they do with the prisoners, I’ll have you all dead, and all the Jedi back where they belong soon, not to worry.” With a tilt of their head, they jumped and pushed off of the hallway wall, launching themself at him feet first.

Stumbling a bit at the force of a whole humanoid landing on him, Kallus quickly recovered and pushed them back and off with the force pike.

“Not if I have anything to say about it.” He said with a growl, jabbing the pike towards them viciously. Another cold laugh was their only reply, and the fight continued, finally having moved all the way into the hallway. He hoped he could at least buy enough time for Hera and Zeb to get the prisoners out. Whatever happened to him, he couldn’t let the Empire keep these people anymore.

Back in the room, Zeb was cutting down a confused and frightened zabrak, trying to whisper as reassuringly as he could while he could still hear the clashes of weapons outside of the room. But as he wrapped the zabrak in one of his blankets, he heard the distinct sound of lightsaber against lightsaber, and relaxed ever so slightly. Luke was back, and Kal was safer for it.

“Zeb!” Hera shouted at him across the room at him. “If Skywalker listened, there’s a trooper helmet out there that I need to be able to save this kel dor.” Zeb nodded, and threw himself out of the door, into the fighting of the hallway.

Glancing around clinically, he spotted the helmet lying on the ground farther down the hallway, but luckily the three-way fight wasn’t between him and it, so he set off for it.

But of course, it couldn’t be that easy, and as he got closer to the intersection of hallways Luke had dropped it at, more purge troopers rounded the corner, and began to fire.

“Karabast! How are there always more of you?!” Lunging forward at the squad, he quickly grabbed the helmet with one of his feet, and launched it down the hallway behind him, shouting at Hera.

“More purge troopers Hera! Get that kel dor out and then help me take them out!”

Cursing, Hera gestured for the rescued to stay in the room, and went out the door, blaster at the ready. Seeing the helmet, she grabbed it and quickly fired a few shots at the purge troopers occupying Zeb before ducking back into the room and running over to the last occupied tube.

Looking up at it, she saw the man had opened his eyes, pure black, and was watching her, much calmer than she had expected, but still with fear in his eyes.

“I know. I can’t take you out into the air, the oxygen would kill you. I’m going to try to switch settings on this helmet to make it keep you safe.”

Looking down at the helmet, she quickly shoved it onto her head, ignoring the dull pains from her lekku as she squished them into the helmet enough to see the HUD.

Swearing under her breath, she started to vocally command the helmet’s systems to switch from human habitable to kel dor settings. Cursing as she saw that wasn’t one of the life-support options available, she quickly instructed it into switching to the specific gasses she knew the kel dor would need. Soon enough, the helmet was giving her a warning, a final chance to back out of the command, sensing that she _wasn’t_ a species that could survive in the helium atmosphere she was creating.

Ignoring the warning, she made the switch, and as quick as she could after seeing the confirmation message pop up, yanked the helmet off. She gave a quick nod to the kel dor inside the tube, which he returned in kind taking in a deep breath in before she yanked the door open. She quickly shoved the helmet onto him, apologizing as she crushed his various facial appendages inside, and then grabbed her blade to cut through the restraints. Once free, she saw his chest rise and fall slightly, testing his helmet, and then saw his hand curl into an old Jedi military symbol for “good to go” that she had seen Kanan do a few times in stealth missions. Heaving a sigh of relief, she threw a blanket around him before dashing into the hallway to join the fight.

“Rex, Wolffe, come in. Where are you two?!”

Quickly she got a slightly breathless Rex.

“On our way General! Just got the first batch of rescues out to Chop on the landing platform, he was herding them to the ship, and we started running back. We should be there any minute sir!”

Giving a slight grunt in return, Hera took aim and started firing towards the hostiles that were left. Zeb had managed to knock out one of the purge troopers, leaving him in a better position than before. Looking around, she saw that Kal had joined Zeb against the remaining purge troopers, and while she couldn’t see Luke or the inquisitor anymore, she could hear lightsaber fighting down a nearby hallway. Joining the boys against the last troopers, they defeated one of them just as the two clones rounded the corner behind them.

“Rex! Wolffe! There’s another group of rescues in that room! And don’t panic about the one wearing a purge trooper helmet, he can’t breathe this air so we had to improvise.”

Immediately turning back to the battle, the clones followed her example and barreled into the room, coming face to face with another haggard group of ten, with a tall, leathery skinned man wearing a purge trooper helmet standing in front of the group. Almost protectively?

Wasting no time, the clones start urging the group to follow them.

“Alright everyone, this way! We have to get you out of here and back to the ship where you can rest!” Rex barked, and they both turned away to lead the group out.

Wolffe began to step out of the room when he was suddenly yanked backwards by an invisible force, landing on his ass in front of the group of rescues. But Rex saw immediately after Wolffe had peeked his head out and was tugged back, a stray blaster bolt had shot past, right where his head would have been. Slightly dazed, Wolffe looked up at the helmeted man who had partially doubled over breathing in deeply, before a croaky voice emerged through the purge trooper helmet’s voice scrambler.

“Commander… you really must be more careful than that...”

Rex and Wolffe’s eyes widened, and Wolffe practically jumped from the floor and pulled the man into a hug, voice breaking.

“G-general.”

As much as he didn’t want to, Rex cleared his throat and brought them back to their senses before leading everyone out into the hall. Making their way out of the complex, they left the new rescues with Chopper again, before running back inside to the group.

Having defeated the new purge troopers, and with Luke nowhere in sight, Hera pulled their helmets off, revealing more clones. She sighed heavily and turned to Zeb.

“If we’re taking all of the troopers back to have their chips removed… I don’t think we’ll have enough room on the Ghost.” She frowned and thought for a second before activating her commlink.

“Chopper? How’s the Ghost looking? Yes, I _know_ it’s probably crowded, but you’ll just have to deal with that. Yes I know Chop. Chopper, I need you to try contacting base, see if you can get Dodonna, or even AP or Wedge. Anyone who is high command or who can relay to high command that we have more rescues and prisoners than we can bring back on the ghost, and that we’ll need backup. Yes Chop I have thought of that. Send them the hyperspace logs from the trip, and they should be able to get here without Luke’s guidance. Oh, and Chopper? Tell them to bring a medical droid, and at least a couple anti-ox masks. Yes I’m sure you figured that out yourself, I’m just reminding you. Chop I don’t have time for this! …No, we haven’t found him… But the computer said there were at least 50 imprisoned, and we’ve only sent you 20 so far. Yes I will let you know. Yes. I need to go.” Hera sighed and flicked off her comm, rubbing her forehead.

“Chop’s going to try to contact base, get a bigger ship here to bring out more people, and any ships they can get from closer to the unknown regions, since they’ll have less hyperspace jumps to make and they can be here faster.”

Zeb and Kallus nodded.

“Right now, we need to find the other thirty people here. We also have to find where Skywalker went. We know inquisitors better than he does, and the Alliance can’t afford to lose him.” She pinches the bridge of her nose before continuing. “Any ideas for where to start?”

Kallus gestured down one of the hallways.

“If we took the command center of the base, we _might_ be able to convince any remaining purge troopers to give in. Unlikely, but possible. It would also cut off their ability to send troops after us or block our use of the computers.”

“Right. Let’s get to it. We’ll check every room on our way past though, we have to make sure we don’t miss anyone.” She paused and frowned, before turning on her comlink. “Skywalker! We’re going to try to take the command center! Do you need someone to join you?”

A breathless Luke came through on their comms. “I uh… don’t think there’s much you can do! I’ll try to keep them off of you while you do that!” A grunt and a few more crashes of sabers were heard before the comm disconnected.

“You heard him, let’s get to it. Rex, Wolffe, where are you?” Instead of getting an answer from her comm, they heard a yell from the end of the hallway, and turned to see Rex and Wolffe coming at them again.

“Right here General!”

Letting the clones catch up to them, they all started quickly making their way to the command center.

“This is the room.” Kallus whispered. Hera nodded back at him, and he slammed the button and they all ran in the door.

There to greet them were 5 purge troopers, and two imperial guards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of surprises in there huh? Who else might they find..


	4. Command

The shooting began immediately, fighting over the control panels as the Spectres and co tried to knock out each of the troopers as fast as possible.

Zeb threw himself over the control panels, landing in the centre of them all, and growling before extending his bo-rifle and swinging.

Kallus ran around to the other side of the ring of panels, and jabbed the force pike into the back of one of the troopers. He let out a garbled yell through the helmet, and Kallus winced as he noticed out of the corner of his eye Rex and Wolffe flinch.

Rex recovered in time to catch the fist that came flying at his face. He looked up surprised at the impassive helmet of the purge trooper. Why was he punching him? He clearly had guns… why- Before Rex could really think any harder about it, he had to dodge out of the way of a spin kick.

“What the kark is this guy doing!?” Really getting over his surprise, he started to fight back. Eventually, the purge trooper tried another jump kick, but this time Rex was ready, he’d sparred with Cody enough back in the Clone Wars to know how to defend against this sort of fighting style. So he ducked the kick, and as the trooper flew over him, unable to stop his momentum, Rex grabbed the kama he was wearing and yanked, hard enough that he couldn’t land on his feet, and fell to the floor. Soon enough, they were wrestling around on the ground, but without the acrobatics it was a fairer fight. Managing to pin the guy down, Rex hit his head down into the ground, wincing a bit as he did it, but he knew that the helmets were pretty good at preventing any _serious_ brain injuries. Sure enough, that was enough to do it and the trooper went limp underneath him. Too curious to find out what idiot was using martial arts in a blaster fight, Rex pulled his helmet off then and there, blaster fire being exchanged overtop of him.

He choked out a gasp, and held the man's face in his hand.

He traced the light scar from the clone’s forehead down to his cheek. He was here… of course he was here.

Above him, he heard a shout that broke him out of his stupor.

“Rex! I’m sure that he’s important but we could _really use your help here!”_ Jumping to his feet, he rejoined the fight, even more determined not to kill any of the purge troopers. If Cody was here, who were the rest of these? Looking around the fight with fresh eyes, he started to recognize fighting patterns from back in the day. Tendencies, weak points, things he knew from days worth of sparring and practicing with his brothers. Sending Wolffe an internal comm, he made his way to two of the troopers. Boil and Waxer. He’d seen Cody spar with them so many times when the 212 and the 501st shared missions. How could he not recognize this fighting? He saw them using the same tactics as they did during the war, keeping their eyes on each other, watching each other’s backs. But that meant he knew their weakness. Nodding at Wolffe, he lunged forward, tackling Waxer before he could get a shot off on him. Sure enough, the second Waxer was in real danger, Boil was distracted, and Wolffe grabbed him and wrestled his blaster away easily enough. Within a few minutes, between him and Wolffe they had the two down and cuffed, away from the remaining fight.

Looking around, Hera was in a shootout with one clone, while Kallus dueled an imperial guard with his new force pike, and Zeb roared, stuck between dueling a guard, and being shot in the back by a trooper. Nodding to each other again, they set out for different troopers, Wolffe to help Hera, and Rex to get the other one off of Zeb’s back.

After a few minutes exchanging blaster shots and punches equally, he was able to pinpoint who this was. Doom. Kriffing hells, this one was gonna be trouble.

Across the room, Wolffe was having better luck. Between him and Hera, they had managed to advance closer towards the clone who was shooting from behind one of the taller control panels near the edge of the room. He had a pretty good idea who this one was, the tactic was one he had seen other commanders use multiple times, but usually they’d have a Jedi General in front of them. No such luck this time. Soon enough with cover fire from Hera, he was able to get to him and knock the gun out of his hand, and wrestle him down and cuff him. By the time he had turned around, Hera had already joined the last two fights, shooting whenever there was an opening in the melee. Crossing the room, he saw Rex finally get a solid enough hit to knock out the last trooper, as Zeb electrocuted the guard he was fighting. Seeing his last two allies go down, the last imperial let his guard down, and Kallus was able to stab him in the back with the force pike.

Looking around and seeing that the room was clear, Hera started to give orders.

“Kallus, get into the system again, see if you can get a map and find exactly where everything is. Zeb, Rex, Wolffe, gather up the clones and get them out of harm's way-” Seeing one of them inching towards a discarded blaster, she let off a warning shot right next to his hand before continuing “and keep them away from the weapons.” Turning away as the boys got to work, she flipped on her comm.

“Luke? We’ve taken the command center. How’s the inquisitor coming?”

“Oh gullible rebellion. You really think this would be enough to take me out?”

Hera’s expression darkened quickly.

“What have you done to him, where are you going?”

“Oh well if I told you that, I wouldn’t be very good at my job, now would I?” Hera heard the inquisitor’s cold laugh through the comm. “If you want your precious Jedi back, you’ll have to try harder than this. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you soon.” With a click, the line closed, and Hera heard only deafening silence, even with the amount of grumbling and complaining coming from the still conscious clones as they were moved. She’d lost another one.

“General? I’ve found the rooms with life signs, and the prisoner manifests. We should have everything we need to get the last Jedi, and all the troopers.” Kallus spoke up from the command terminal he’d been standing over.

“Right. Rex, Wolffe, with me. We have to go get the rest of the prisoners. Zeb, Kallus, you have to go after the inquisitor, they’re escaping with Skywalker.”

Zeb balked at her, while Kallus maintained his carefully schooled expression.

“We won’t let them get away general.” He said, before yanking Zeb away, and soon the sound of their running was lost to the hallways.

Hera turned to the other two, seeing them finish “storing” away the defeated clones, pulling their helmets off with pain in their expressions as they revealed the familiar faces. Sure enough, there was Waxer, Boil, and Doom. Finally, the one Wolffe hadn’t been able to place: Bly. It all suddenly snapped into place. He knew he’d seen that tactic before, it was Bly and Secura’s favourite move, the sword and shield maneuver. He hid back and shot while she blocked shots with her sabre. Noticing her gaze, they got up and stood at the ready. She gave them a small sad smile, and turned to the map Kallus had left up.

Plugging in a small holoprojector Sabine had provided her with before leaving, she started the offloading of a copy of the map to it. While it downloaded, she turned to the clones and spoke softly.

“Who are they?”

Rex’s brow drew together in pain, and he took a second to respond.

“Three of them were 212 soldiers. My battalions were often paired up with them, since General Kenobi and General Skywalker were so close.” He looked at the scowling clones and continued. “The one with the scar, he was the Commander, we were… good friends, brothers. Worked together under the Generals. Those two,” He gestured to Waxer and Boil. “Were two of his soldiers. Good men, loved each other like no other. And they were great with kids.” Hera could hear the emotion beginning to come through his voice and put a light hand on his shoulder.

“And the other two?”

Wolffe stepped in to talk while Rex composed himself.

“That’s Commanders Bly and Doom. Doom was a fierce commander, lotta guerilla tactics. And Bly… he was General Secura’s Commander. She… she was the first one we found in here, with Luke.”

Hearing a ping from the console, she picked up the holoprojector and reattached it to the arm bracer Sabine had provided. Looking back up at the two men, she looked them both in the eyes one at a time and spoke.

“We will get them back. Once we get back to base, and the chips come out… they’ll be back to the men you knew.” Turning the projector on so it shone between the three of them, she started to sound more like General Syndulla, and less like the compassionate Hera.

“Okay. It’s showing three more listed long-term cells for the prisoners, as well as multiple specialised rooms. There’s a log here for a prisoner being transferred to one of the specialised rooms about a day before we arrived, so we have to get to that one for sure. We’ll have to hit all of the rooms, but with the little amount of troopers left we shouldn’t have to bring the rescued back after every room, as long as one of us takes the flank.” Wolffe grunted an assurance, and Hera nodded. “Okay, Wolffe will bring up the rear. We’ll hit this long-term ward first since it’s closest. Let’s go.”

The three of them made their way through the building like the efficient military officers they were, hitting two of the three long term rooms, collecting 20 new weakened Jedi, including a Nautolan, a fair amount of humans, a couple more unique races, and a Mikkian. Every time they picked up more of the Jedi, Wolffe and Rex’s body language became tighter and tighter. Hera could tell that they were recognizing many of the people they were rescuing, and seeing all of the hollow shells of former generals was getting to them. After the two long term rooms, they got to the closest specialised room they had seen on the map. Not knowing what was waiting for them in there, they huddled up in front of the door and started quietly talking about a battle plan.

But then they were interrupted by a frail hand being placed on Rex’s shoulder.

“Captain…” A frail voice to accompany the frail hand sounded from behind him. He turned to see an unfamiliar old woman looking at him. “I can help you… The labs… usually have three troopers in them when we’re in there. Two near the door… and one who helps with the transference.” Seemingly tired out from the talking, she gave him a light pat and retreated back into the crowd of Jedi rescues. Nodding at Rex, Hera and Wolffe positioned themselves on either side of the door and ushered the Jedi around to the sides of the door where they’d be out of the crossfire. Then, ready to shoot either side of the door, they nodded for Rex to hit the button. The door swung open, and he was greeted by the sight of two tables, one raised to a standing position, with a togruta bound to it, and a purge trooper working on something next to it. Sure enough, there was a purge trooper on either side of the door, and Wolffe and Hera shot them non fatally the second the door opened. Meanwhile, Rex lunged at the one near the tables, knocking him to the ground, banging the troopers head on the floor in the process.

Apparently that was all it took for him, because he stayed down under Rex, and he was able to easily cuff him before turning to the togruta. For a split second he had thought it was Ahsoka, but as he looked…

“Master Shaak Ti.” His voice was gentle as he let her down from the restraints. She flopped into his arms, still breathing, but weak. Passing Shaak Ti off to a couple of the stronger Jedi rescues, he joined Wolffe in pulling the helmets off the three -now cuffed, thanks to Wolffe- troopers, and exhaled sadly to see familiar lightning haircut across one of their scalps, one of them that he didn’t recognize, as well as one with big fluffy curls. Preoccupied with seeing his medic again for the first time in a quarter century, he didn’t notice Hera slipping through a doorway in the back of the room, or her returning with a small green woman, until Wolffe let out what sounded like a growl.

Rex looked up and his eyes narrowed.

Leaning on Hera for support was a small Mirialan woman, now almost forty, but she had seemingly grown barely any taller since he last saw her.

“Hera… that girl killed Jedi and framed Ahsoka for it…”

Hera looked up, surprised but angry, and he was surprised to see it was more at him than at Barriss.

“Rex, right now, I don’t care _what_ she did. You think she would be in this lab if she was working for the Sith? No. No one deserves this treatment. If you want her to have a trial, you can do it after she’s recovered.” Giving them her coldest general look, she continued to help Barriss out of the room.

Much to Rex’s surprise, a couple of the Jedi women moved to support Barriss as Hera brought her to the crowd. Rex shook his head. This wasn’t him. Surely 23 years of this had been enough punishment for a lifetime. But he couldn’t stop the anger rising in his chest every time he looked at her, remembering what she did to Ahsoka.

He looked away. He had better things to focus on. They still hadn’t found Kanan, and he was sure Hera was beginning to lose hope.

Sure enough, that was on Hera’s mind. She looked around at the 20 odd jedi they had amassed, and couldn’t help thinking about the two that she couldn’t see. There was only one captive room left, and two individual rooms, which they now knew as labs. She said a quick prayer to the force, much less for her than it was for Kanan, that she’d find him in the last rooms.

Then she turned to the group and ushered them towards the next hallway.

* * *

The pair of them were running through the halls of the base, desperately trying to get back to the landing pads before the inquisitor could take a ship away, taking Luke with them. Zeb couldn’t stop his brain from connecting all the similarities between Luke and Ezra, and it wasn’t helping his panic at Luke slipping away with every minute they didn’t find him. But then, they reached the exterior door, slamming the button and running out onto the landing pad.

Across the way, they saw the inquisitor unceremoniously dragging Luke towards an imperial ship off in a corner, looking seemingly dusty with disuse. (Not like it was visible from that far away, but it definitely looked derelict)

Zeb yelled towards the ship to Chopper, who had come out to see what the action was. Seeing an inquisitor, he beeped a foul string of binary and rushed off back into the Ghost. Paying this hardly any mind, Kallus and Zeb continued pounding towards the inquisitor, hoping to get to them before they could get Luke into the ship, and leave the planet.

Ahead of them, they could see the figure smack the button for the ramp, and drag Luke inside of the ship. Just as they approached the ramp, the ship began lift off, flying higher than Kallus could jump, and quickly approaching too high even for Zeb. But then… it stopped lifting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ohohoho, the boys are back. (And so is Barriss ooooh)  
> Nothing like getting kicked in the face to know it's your brother, right?
> 
> I think I'm going to update weekly for now, on tuesdays, which is why y'all are getting another chapter now! See you back here next Tuesday hopefully, if I've caught your attention.  
> Hope you enjoyed!


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